Many instances arise, in various types of financial, governmental, retail, manufacturing and other establishments, in which signatures or other written indicia on various types of documents must be compared to a reference signature or other reference indicium in order to establish the identity of a person, or the genuineness of a document. Consequently, a need exists for a relatively quick and inexpensive means for recording a reference signature or other indicia in such a way that it can be stored, and rapidly and efficiently recalled and displayed, as for example on a CRT.